Before Dick Clark, Washington Had Boogied on Milt Grant's Show

In the late '50s, I was little brother to a big sister cool enough to be dancing on television.

Nancy was a regular on "The Milt Grant Show," the teen-oriented dance program airing six evenings a week on WTTG (Channel 5), from the top floor of the Harrington Hotel (no relation) at the time. Although I was a little too young to appreciate some of the special guests -- Chuck Berry, Jimmy Clanton, Fabian, Chubby Checker, Bobby Darin, the Everly Brothers -- I instinctively knew this was something special. Later I learned just how special: All the stars of the day made it a point to stop by "The Milt Grant Show," which predated Dick Clark's nationally syndicated "American Bandstand" by a year.

In Washington, Milt Grant was king. He created and hosted Washington's most popular program, which was especially a favorite among the youngsters who either rushed home after school to tune in, or who aspired to become regulars on a show that began like class:

"Hi, kids!"

"Hi, Milt!" (in loud unison).

Thankfully, no lessons ensued -- just a lot of teen styling, circa the late '50s. You'll have to imagine because, sadly, only a single 50-minute kinescope of "The Milt Grant Show" exists, from May 1957, featuring lip-synced performances by artists such as LaVern Baker and Johnnie & Joe; some typically energetic, decidedly nonsexual dancing; and pitches for Motorola radios, Topps "Sir Loiners" and ever-present Pepsi-Cola (nearly a half-century before "American Idol" judges were constantly cradling their Cokes).

"The Milt Grant Show" ran from 1956 to 1961, and Grant had a variety of rock-and-roll, rockabilly and R&B artists as guests. He always made a special effort to land stars appearing at the Howard Theater, but the show itself was segregated -- Washington still being a very Southern city at the time. Grant did have black teenagers on his show, initially once a month, eventually weekly on what came to be known (very unofficially) as Black Tuesdays. It marked one of the few places on television where any African Americans appeared back then, but the world was apparently not ready for interracial dance parties and, as much as he might have wanted to integrate the shows, Grant bowed to pressure from advertisers.

Grant, who was in his mid-80s when he died Saturday at his home in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., might have already looked like your kindly uncle in the 1950s, but he clearly had his finger on the pulse of teen music. Even before his television show, he'd championed rock-and-roll and R&B on his own ad hoc radio network, with a show carried simultaneously on stations WPGC, WINX, WOL and WAVA. Grant was the only Washington DJ ever to wield that kind of power.

And like many popular DJs in that era, Grant also hosted record hops, including regular summertime Miss Teen Queen contests at Glen Echo Park.

Another of Grant's dances produced a rock-and-roll classic. In 1958, the show's occasional house band, the Wraymen, played at a "Milt Grant Record Hop" in Fredericksburg. The Wraymen were backing the Diamonds when Grant asked them to play a stroll ("The Stroll" being one of the Diamonds' biggest hits at the time). Guitarist Link Wray insisted he didn't know how, then improvised after his brother Doug started playing a stroll beat on the drums.

Voila! "Oddball." The crowd reaction was so immediate that the band had to play it three more times that night. With gutbucket menace, awash in echo and reverb, Wray's slow drags across the strings of alternating major chords, capped by a run of notes up and down the fretboard, pretty much invented the power chord -- and created a template for modern rock guitar. When Wray finally recorded it, he called it "Rumble."

"American Bandstand" began its long run in 1957; by 1961, "The Milt Grant Show" was off the air, replaced by "Robin Hood" reruns. The station's new owner, Metromedia, did not approve of rock-and-roll.

Grant would soon develop a much higher profile in broadcast circles in the '60s. He acquired one of the early UHF frequencies and founded Capitol Broadcasting Corp., which operated WDCA (Channel 20). Grant would continue buying, selling and owning television stations for the next three decades, but Washingtonians of a certain age will remember him most fondly from the days when "The Milt Grant Show" was must-see TV.